Caught Up in the Touch (16 page)
What he didn’t realize was that she had already admitted defeat. She wanted him. Not because of a job, not because of her father, or his father. Just … because.
One of his hands cupped her nape while the other supported her back. His tongue flicked at her lips, and she opened her mouth, tilting her head and grabbing his shoulders with both of her hands, clutching and pulling the soft cotton of his shirt.
The hand on her back moved lower, over her bottom, and he pushed his pelvis into hers. Something hard pressed against her belly. An erection. His erection. He wanted her too. She slid her tongue alongside his.
Her mind refused to be quieted. How long had it been since she’d allowed passion to wrest her control away? What would happen if she did? Would he hurt her? Would she hurt him?
Hush,
her body hissed.
He took control, helping to muffle the damning voice. He cupped her bottom with both hands, lifted her to her toes, and pressed her against the cool planks next to the front door. Then encircling her forearms with his hands, he pressed them on either side of her head. His gentle domination softened her resistance and sparked her senses. Her crippling doubts turned to ash.
Her head lolled back, and he pressed kisses down her neck. If he hadn’t been supporting her, she might have crumpled like a marionette at his feet. She curled her leg around his calf, needing to feel him against her. He hiked her leg up farther and slid his hand under the bunched edge of her skirt to squeeze her thigh.
He raised his head from her neck, and she wove her free hand through his hair, trying to pull his mouth to her. He resisted. “You need to understand something, Jessie.”
“What?” Trepidation stiffened her in his arms.
“This thing between us doesn’t have a damn thing to do with Montgomery Industries. I’m kissing you because I want you.” He circled his erection against her hipbone. “Why are you kissing me?”
She shifted forward and kissed him roughly, nipping and sucking at his bottom lip, giving an answer she was unable to put into words. Their tongues entwined and danced.
He pulled his lips from hers, yet close enough to feel his puffs of breath. “Why are you kissing me?”
A heated embarrassment added to the maelstrom of emotion battling inside of her. She never cursed, much less talked dirty.
He shifted his torso backward, and she tried to follow but he recaptured her arms in his gentle grasp and pressed them against the side of the house. “Do you want more? Tell me.”
Her breasts ached to be back against his hard chest. She looked to the side, where bugs swarmed a dim streetlight, her eyes almost drifting shut. “Of course, I want you. I wanted you before I knew who you were. When you were rough and filthy and my Mountain Man.”
His rumbling growl vibrated through her body. He dropped a hand to her thigh and rucked her skirt higher. His hand settled over her bottom and squeezed. The warmth of his big, callused hand intensified the throb between her legs. She curled her pelvis toward him and instigated another kiss.
Nothing mattered except the press of his body, his lips, his hands. Worries of the past and fears of the future didn’t exist. Only this one moment, perhaps the only moment they would have. How could she let him go?
She twisted her arm out of his grasp and went to work on his shirt, yanking it out of his pants, desperate to feel his skin. The one leg supporting her trembled, and she fell farther into his embrace, burying her face in his masculine-scented neck, finally freeing his shirt from the waistband of his jeans. She ran her hands up his back, all smooth, flexing muscle as he shifted to support more of her weight.
“I should leave,” he said on a groan.
A shot of fear tempered her desire. Fear he would walk away and their brief, explosive connection would be severed forever.
“Don’t go.” She wanted him to claim her, right here against the house, but the plea couldn’t make the leap to her mouth over her long-held teachings. “Please.”
“I’m trying to be a goddamn gentleman, but you’re making things a mite difficult, darlin’.”
A sweet wave rushed through her at his drawling endearment. Something beyond the physical. Breathless, she said, “Maybe you shouldn’t try so hard.”
She raked her fingernails down his back. His head fell back with a gasp. He hiked her leg higher on his hip. His blistering open-mouthed kiss stole a moan from her oxygen-deprived lungs.
He skated his fingers over the damp fabric of her panties, landing where she craved him most. Her hips bucked at his soft, exploring touch. Then his hand was gone, and he pushed her leg to the ground. Wrapping her tight in his arms, he pressed her back and laid his forehead on the wall of the house. He breathed as if he’d been running suicide drills with the team.
The moment was slipping through her fingers, as elusive as catching snowflakes. Even though he still held her, a familiar sense of loneliness pervaded. “Did I do something wrong?”
He lifted his head to meet her eyes, but the moon had risen above the portico, leaving them in deep shadows. His voice came out rusty but with a hint of humor. “Wrong? Depends on your definition. You nearly had me fucking you against this wall, and you’re so responsive, you’d probably wake the neighbors.”
His assessment had her pulling her head back to look him in the eye. “I’m not.”
His teeth flashed white. “You don’t even hear your sexy little moans and whimpers, do you?”
She skimmed her lips along his stubbled jaw to hide her surprise and flushing cheeks.
“Don’t be embarrassed. They’re a huge turn-on.” His voice was soft in her ear, and he nipped at her earlobe. The heat of her embarrassment transformed and grew her need. She went in search of his lips, but he evaded her.
“Jessie…” he breathed the nickname in her ear on a huff of laughter. “You deserve more than a quick fuck.”
She tried on a casual, teasing voice to hide her desperation. “Maybe that’s all I want, Mountain Man.”
This time he took a step back, leaving her against the wall. “
Is
that all you want? I kind of thought we had more going on than that.”
She blinked, wondering how she ended up begging for a quickie while he sounded hurt about it. Most men would kill for what she was offering … wouldn’t they? “My life’s a mess, Logan. I quit my job and don’t have anything else lined up. I won’t be able to hide out in Falcon and ignore my family forever. And, trust me, you do not want to be within a hundred square miles of the fallout.”
He continued backward until he was leaning against a column on the opposite side of the porch. She pulled her rucked skirt back to her knees before tucking her hands behind her back against the wall. She still needed the support.
“Come down to Adaline’s, and I’ll give you some work.”
“I’ve never waited tables.”
He glanced down and to the side, a smile playing at his mouth. “That would not be a good use of your talents. Although, I have no doubt you’d get big tips if you wore those heels. No, I’ve let my invoices pile up. With the first football game tomorrow, I could use some help. I realize it’s a matter of simple bookkeeping, but it’ll give you something to do. You can start Monday morning.”
“You’ll pay me?”
“Yep. Can’t afford to pay you what you were offering
me
though.”
The irony of the situation was nearly too perfect. He was being nice, offering her a job, because that’s the kind of man he was. “All right. I’ll be there Monday at nine sharp.”
He stepped toward her, but instead of taking her in his arms, he pressed his hands against the wall, brushed a kiss against her temple, and nosed in her hair. Her eyes closed as a wave of goose bumps travelled over her body, and she shuddered with pent-up frustration.
“Wear something sexy,” he whispered in her ear and was gone.
The chilled night air replaced the warmth of his body. When she opened her eyes, he was opening his car door. She stepped forward and called out, “That sounds like harassment.”
“Take it up with your boss.” He tossed her another grin. The car was out of sight before the sound of the engine faded. A bullfrog’s mournful cry for a mate filled the night. With her body still thrumming from the high of Logan’s touch, she could empathize with its plight.
The next morning, the sun slicing between the curtains and across the bed woke her. Jessica wiggled her toes, the light reflecting like snow off the white duvet. Under the covers, as if she might get caught, she ran her hands from her hips and over her unusually sensitive breasts.
What would his big hands feel like on her breasts? Or his mouth? Her nipples peaked against the old concert T-shirt she had borrowed from Lilliana. A combination of endorphins and unsatisfied sexual energy drove her out of bed, wide-awake and itching to get the day started.
She slipped into clean underwear and dug out her red pencil skirt. The waist hooked, but the zipper was a quarter inch from closing over her hips. Dropping the skirt to the floor, she stood in front of the floor-length pivoting mirror and slowly raised her gaze to assess the carnage.
Her breasts bulged from the top of her C-cup bra. The dip between her waist and hips was noticeably more pronounced, making her waist look smaller. Her stomach was still flat, but she’d better work in an occasional run if she wanted to keep it that way.
Her mother, who could make a fortune guessing people’s weights at carnivals, would be horrified. With one searing glance, her mother could tell when she’d overindulged. Between the pizzas, the decadent dinners with Logan, and the bowls of ice cream and drinks she and Lilliana shared most nights before bed while talking about everything and nothing, Jessica guessed she’d put on ten pounds.
Yet … Logan had told her she was too skinny. Jessica spun and checked out her butt. Maybe a tad bigger. Shockingly, she didn’t feel like crawling back under the covers. She raised her arms over her head and wiggled her hips. Her breasts shimmied. The extra weight hadn’t bothered him in the least.
Her gaze dropped to the thin white scars spiking out from the top and bottom edges of her panties on her left hip. She took pains to keep them covered, and her few serious boyfriends hadn’t delved any deeper when she told them the scars were from a childhood accident.
She presented a challenge for men, but once conquered, they eventually moved on to less complicated women. Not that she blamed them. Her job was—had been—her priority, and in her experience, men required more ego stroking than she was willing to supply.
Things with Logan were different. Gawky and uncertain around him, she was the one who required reassurances, but her scars hadn’t even crossed her mind last night with Logan. She’d shared more of herself with him than she’d ever intended to. He seemed to understand her, not in the nodding way her therapist did, but bone-deep. It scared her. It excited her.
She grabbed a different skirt, tight but zippable, and her last clean silk blouse, the delicate fabric pulling apart over her bust. Either she would need to crash diet or buy new clothes. Working at Adaline’s probably pushed option one off the table. How could she resist his mac and cheese?
The smell of hazelnut coffee drew Jessica straight to the kitchen. Instead of the baggy paint-splattered T-shirt she normally wore, Lilliana stood at the sink in a tight blue and white Falcon T-shirt that accentuated surprisingly full breasts on her petite frame.
Lilliana got down another mug, poured her a cup, and handed it over. “You ready?”
“I-I don’t start until Monday.” Had Logan told Lilliana already?
“Monday? I’m talking about Falcon’s first game tonight.”
Jessica relaxed and propped her hip on the counter. “So that’s what all the blue and white bunting is about downtown. I’ve never been to a football game.”
“Bless your heart.” Lilliana looked at her as if she were an alien life form. She tucked a book with receipts shooting out of either end under her arm and headed toward the mudroom. “You’re coming tonight, so you’d best trot your booty downtown and buy a team T-shirt. By the way, Jeb called and said your car is fixed.”
Jessica grabbed the keys to her loaner. “You need anything from town?”
Lilliana dropped the account book by the computer and rubbed at her forehead, her worry palpable. “Could you stop by the bank and bribe Ben Larkin to approve my loan? I’m stuck on renovations until he does.”
Jessica gave her a tight, commiserating smile. “I could loan—”
Lilliana held her hands up, warding off the offer. “I appreciate the thought, but I refuse to borrow money from a friend.”
“You’ll make it work, Lilliana. Miss Esmerelda has faith in you, and so do I.”
“Faith is fine in church but doesn’t go too far in the real world. I learned that a long time ago. Now, I’m going to depress myself a little longer by checking my math. Speaking of my aunt, you mind returning the library books?” Lilliana sat at the computer and clamped a pen between her teeth.
After trading the cars and paying Jeb, a bespectacled man who besides the grease under his nails looked like he would be more at home in the local bank, Jessica parked on Main Street. Besides the unusual number of people strolling in and out of shops, something else struck her. Everyone wore blue, white, or a combination of the two.
She joined the crowd, wandering in and out of various shops, buying some new, more-casual clothes at a women’s boutique. In Richmond, the total wouldn’t have registered, but now without a job, she had to take a deep breath before handing over her credit card. She left wearing a pair of crisp white shorts and a snug-fitting V-neck blue cotton shirt embossed with a flying falcon holding a football in huge talons. When in Rome and all that.
She tossed the bags of new clothes into the car and grabbed the books to return to the library. She’d read the political thriller but hadn’t cracked open the nonfiction account of the stock market crash of 2001.
The mid-morning sun was already brutal, amplified by the asphalt. In contrast, the marble of the library reflected the high-powered AC. Jessica had an urge to lie down and press her cheek against the floor. Miss Esmeralda stood behind the circulation desk.